Of Undiscovered Countries
by The Lurking Writer
Summary: A tale of discovery… dare you read on, and find something for yourself?… Please rate and review...


**Author:** The Lurking Writer

**Title:** Of Undiscover'd Countries

**Summary: **A tale of discovery… dare you read, and find something for yourself… 

**Rating:** PG

**Word Count:** 888

**Disclaimer:** None of this bar the plot can be called property of this author. All else is property of JK Rowling, all publishers concerned and Warner Bros. Inc, and the name "_Potent Voyager_" was borrowed from a series of novels written by Terry Pratchett, known as Discworld. No copyright infringement is intended, and no monetary gain will occur from the creation of this story. 

**Author's Note(s):** "_The undiscover'd country from whose bourn / No traveller returns_," is taken from Hamlet, written by William Shakespeare. I do not own this line, in any way, shape or random form.

Also, for the purposes of this story, the eyes of the main character are blue.

This is my first attempt at writing something under 2000 words in length, so I apologise if it's missing something… a plot, say… 

* * *

Fleeting thoughts, just as the deer run wild at dusk, slipped quietly through her scarred mind. Why she had fled Britain not even Merlin knew. Solemnly and with brazen eyes, she glimpsed of speckled hills and crocheted fields – she knew not the country's name, and nor did she need to. All she wanted – yes, all she needed – to know was that she'd never yet set foot on its virgin soils, and that no trace of her past could follow and take from her the freedom from pain she'd shed tears and blood for.

Not much longer, she realised, and the ship would dock at the cosy port that bridled the tiniest of peninsulas – a jut of terra firma that reached out from the mainland like a gnarled talon. The ship's captain had called it "Animula," for reasons that were both alien and natural to her – "the little life."

As she gazed at the ever-diminishing distance between boat and shore, she marvelled under the cerulean skies and over cobalt waves. The view before her own blues was of a scene so vibrant and full of life she could not hope to feel the cool clutch of misery on her shoulder, beckoning her back to the world she thought she could leave behind.

The fresh sea air assaulted her senses gently, almost, but it was an assault nonetheless, for as the port came ever nearer, a briny wave crashed against and crept up and over the hull, spraying her in a fine, white mist. By the time she'd shaken her hair, and wiped the moisture from her eyes, the ship had slowed considerably.

Waving her goodbyes and gratefulness to the crew of the _Potent Voyager_, she half-skipped away down the boarding ramp and took her first footfalls in this new world as a toddler would make their own first steps without aid.

She breathed in more than the new scent, the smell of the sea itself washing in through the winding streets like its waves through craggy, twisting cracks in the rocky beach. An undercurrent of fish, and a warm flavour she'd come to adore – that of salt and vinegar, sprinkled over freshly cooked chips (or fries, as some of her fellow voyagers would no doubt call them).

It was as if she had been transported not to a distant land, but to a forgotten memory, where her parents had often taken her during the summer months away from muggle schooling. They had been strict, but no less memorable times, and she looked back on them far more fondly than she could her tenure at Hogwarts.

Choking back a sob, and wiping away the mist that clouded her sight momentarily, she continued walking along through the alleyways and roads – cutting 'cross more than one street which would barely pass for a lane back… home. She was reluctant to think of anything in that manner anymore, and so tried her utmost not to… but sometimes words simply had a way of appearing, without prior consent from her conscious mind. Such was the way of things, she knew, for all who lived and died, but still she ached for it to no longer affect her.

  
At last she'd reached the destination she'd set out for herself the moment she'd seen it, towering over the small quayside settlement like a benevolent, petrified troll. The rocky overhang that was part of the mountainside itself jutted out like a proud hook, or the sharpened beak of a hawk. From atop the petite plateau that comprised the side that faced the heavens, she could see the ocean swept out before her like some jewel encrusted, sapphire quilt lain flat against a constantly moving mattress.

A glint of almost white, golden light flickered below her, on the jetty from which she'd departed the Potent Voyager; an elderly figure robed in midnight blue and deep orchid held one hand high above his silvery mane, and she knew it to be the sign. He swept round and strode serenely back onto the main deck and disappeared into the cabins, lowering the outstretched arm as he did so.

The man had handed a musty tome to her, before she'd even left Hogwarts, and it had been bound in aged leather that had been old when Dumbledore was but a twinkle in his mother's sapphire eyes. She pulled it from her canvas satchel, now, and opened it to a seemingly random part. And from the page that lay open before her, she read.

"_The undiscover'd country from whose bourn, no traveller returns_."

She liked the sound of that. She revelled in the way the words not only rolled lightly off her tongue, but in the way their meaning resonated in her like a beacon of Truth. She had travelled to a never-before-seen country, and now she wished to visit just one more… one she hoped past and pain could not pursue her to.

She returned the book to her satchel, pulled out her wand, and leapt from the outcropping with eager fervour down the slope…

Few know of what became of the woman, and even less chose to voice the knowledge to the wizarding world. It was felt, by some, that she deserved the peace and bliss that she could never have discovered in these lands. None would forget Cho Chang.

~*~ Finis ~*~


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